


Invincible

by simgirl97



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-28
Updated: 2013-09-28
Packaged: 2017-12-27 21:22:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/983765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simgirl97/pseuds/simgirl97
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony Stark likes to believe himself invincible. This is one example of when he was very wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Invincible

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own any of the characters or films that they originate from.
> 
> I would like to thank Jamie who both gave me the idea and then Beta'd it for me. She is amazing. All the speech from Tony has been moderated by her as I really cannot write Tony.

Tony shoved his hands on the side of the desk, sending the chair spinning across the room. He artfully dodged DUM-E who seemed to be enjoying rolling around in the middle of the lab and generally getting in the way as usual. He retrieved the drink that was the initial reason for this - admittedly fun - little jaunt and returned to the repulsor that he was working on. 

“DUM-E, what the hell are you doing?” DUM-E whistled gently in reply. “Just stay out of the way.” 

Tony found his drink with his free hand, eyes still fixed on the intricate wiring he was tinkering with, taking a swig. It was this exact moment that DUM-E, trying to win his creator’s attention, tapped him on the shoulder.

Swallowing is decidedly difficult when being scared by something you built, which is how Tony ended up coughing and spluttering.   
“It’s not too late to become a wine rack." Tony snapped at the little robot. "Thor has probably broken something by now and if you do anything like that to me again, you will be dismantled to replace it. Understood?” 

DUM-E whistled mournfully and rolled into a corner so as not to incur his master’s wrath. Tony turned back to analyse the damage DUM-E had caused, and that is when it happened.

The pain was unreal. He didn’t even know what had caused it, he had only hiccupped. It felt like his lungs had been beaten to a pulp. It felt like he had been hit in the chest with Mjolnir, and this was speaking from personal experience: Thor didn’t believe in using less than full strength when training, and he had tested the Iron Man suit to its limits on more than a couple of occasions.

“JARVIS, I’m dying. I’m dying and it is all DUM-E’s fault!” he moaned at the room at large.

“Shall I call Dr Banner, or is it just another cold?” JARVIS retorted in his cool, crisply accented voice. The pain came again and Tony cried out.

“If you’re not going to help I’ll find someone else, damn you.”

Tony stumbled toward the lift and slumped against the back wall as it travelled up toward the penthouse; where it was most likely that someone would be around. Another wave of pain hit on the way up that left him gasping for breath, sprawled in a heap on the floor. 

~~~~~

Natasha was sat on the worktop of the bar watching the proceedings. Tony had escaped to one of his many labs earlier after the fun had started and Natasha strongly wished that she too could get away, but, unlike their billionaire host, she had nowhere to go. 

Clint and Thor were arguing about what was the strongest thing on Earth, with Clint suggesting numerous things that could, possibly, theoretically, be stronger than Mjolnir, but Thor refused to budge on the matter as usual. This was an unofficial holiday with the Avengers now. Whenever Thor was able to escape Asgard, he found Jane and took her to see the sights of any of the cities they were near. It was Steve who suggested that since Thor was here so rarely they all met up when he was on Earth.

Thor was just about to demonstrate the power of Mjolnir when the lift doors opened. She didn’t look round, expecting Tony to swan out and make some snarky comment on the proceedings. When he didn’t, she jumped deftly off the counter, immediately taking a defensive stance: something is always wrong when Tony doesn’t comment, and Natasha was readying herself for an intruder, someone who had somehow managed to get through JARVIS and the numerous level of security around Stark Tower. It was a genuine shock for her to see Tony curled up on the floor and whimpering.

“Tony!” she exclaimed, making Clint and Thor turn their heads and rush toward the lift. “What’s wrong?”

Tony’s head snapped up when he heard Natasha’s worried voice. Of course she would deny all accusations later, but it was nice to know that she cared enough to be worried about his wellbeing. What worried him most right now was that, although the latest spike of pain had abated, he now had a burning pain that wouldn’t go away, and was getting steadily worse with each hiccup. It was also getting hard to breathe, and he was scared of how much more of this he could take. Thor, Clint and Natasha weren’t doing much to help, crowding around him like this, doing nothing when he was so obviously in pain.

“Hey, Point Break, Legolas, if you have nothing better to do than stand and gawp,” He winced, trying not to show the pain that was tearing through him, “could you possibly do something to help, like, for example, find Bruce.” His weak attempt at mockery to prove he was not, in fact, as bad as felt failed to work, and he knew it. He was in too much pain to be anywhere near the level of convincing that he needed. His major hope now was Bruce.

In a fit of curiosity, Bruce had made a very detailed study into each of the Avengers to see how their physiology made them different to everyone else. He was particularly fascinated by Tony and how the Arc Reactor fitted almost seamlessly like it had always been there. He hoped that this knowledge would be able to diagnose what this mysterious pain was and how to get rid of it once and for all. 

When Bruce jogged round the corner, Clint and Thor in tow, Tony's relief was almost tangible. In the short time spent waiting, Natasha had helped him over to a chair, where he sat, slumped, moving only to pant after each wave of pain, his shoulders tightening with each sharp spike of the steadily worsening pain.

“I’m sure he’s fine Doc,” Natasha said, her arms crossed. “Probably fell over something in the lab, going by the state he keeps it in, and now he thinks he's dying. It’s not like it’s the first time he's overreacted.” She was lucky that Tony was in no fit state to hit out at her, because otherwise he wouldn’t have hesitated to aim a punch at her for that smug superiority. 

He realised, too late, that this was a test of just how much pain he was in. She knew that after being provoked like that he would lash out unless he was physically unable. He hiccupped again and then whimpered as the pain peaked once more. Bruce jumped into action, asking exactly where it hurt and what had caused the pain in the first place.

Tony could tell when Bruce had found a diagnosis, and he could tell that it wasn’t good. Bruce dropped his head in his hands and let out a long sigh, the light from the holograms casting a blue light across his skin. He had been looking over some of the data he had previously collected; obviously checking to make sure that his hypothesis was correct. Bruce didn’t stop looking until he was certain, and he had stopped now.

“Do you want the good news or the bad news first?” He asked. By this time Steve had heard of Tony’s mysterious illness, and all the Avengers were now crowded round the chair where Tony was curled up, waiting for the diagnosis.

It was Steve that spoke, taking his usual command role. “Let's have the good news first. Please." He remembered his ever-present manners a second later than normal. Despite how he may have wanted to hide it, his state of worry was beginning to show itself, just a little.

“Well, I think it should be easy to treat, given that it is only hiccups.” 

Clint started laughing at Tony, who was still curled up and whimpering, complaining about hiccups. Natasha and Steve looked puzzled at the diagnosis, whilst Thor was confused more about what hiccups were rather than whether or not Bruce was right.

"If you think... this is just hiccups, we shouldn't... be calling you a... doctor anymore," Tony replied snidely, panting heavily in his fight for breath, whimpering at the end as another one hit.

“That is where the bad news comes in,” Bruce explained holding up a hand for silence, mainly from a still sniggering Clint, and ignoring Tony's put down. “You really aren’t built for it.” He turned and pulled up a diagram of the Arc Reactor's position, using it to illustrate his point. “Where the Arc Reactor sits is fine for normal activities and it can take a fair beating, as God knows you have, many times, proven, however, hiccups are, in essence, forcing all your organs upwards. Your diaphragm expands, your lungs move sharply upward and all this pushes them into the Arc Reactor casing.

“As I said, it should be easy to treat given that it's only hiccups, but we will need to check for internal damage afterwards. There is a high chance that there will at least be bruising if not internal bleeding. I'm sure I don’t need to tell you the worst case scenario, and I don’t want to tell you how likely it is.” He took a deep breath before lightening the mood slightly by saying: “Who knows any good cures for hiccups then?”

Everyone muttered for a bit before Pepper suggested that Tony hold his breath. 

“I am having… enough trouble breathing… as it is… I am not… going to hold…my breath!”

“What about taking a spoonful of sugar?” Natasha suggested. “I've never tried it myself but it's said to work. I mean, it can’t hurt to try, can it?” 

Steve brought the sugar bowl and a spoon round to Tony who straightened up slightly, wincing at the movement. He took the spoon and filled it with sugar, swallowing in one gulp.

There was a moment of silence with everyone staring at Tony, not daring to hope they had beaten it so easily. Clint stood up opening his mouth to speak, when another hiccup hit, sending Tony crying out in pain. The whole group deflated at their failure, descending into thoughts of other alternatives. Clint slid back down to the floor with the others, folding himself into a ball, eyes wide and watching.

It was Steve who spoke up next. “How about if you drink a glass of water backwards?”

“How in the hell… do you drink water… backwards?” Tony panted.

Steve moved to the bar area, gathering two glasses of water and bringing them back to the group. Handing one glass to Natasha, he used the other to demonstrate how to drink water backwards. He straightened up again, looking at Tony expectantly as he took the glass from Natasha and tried it. In hindsight, it was a bad plan. All was going well until a few tentative sips in he hiccupped again, sending water splashing out of the glass and Tony spluttering for breath.

“I always used to do a handstand when I had hiccups as a kid. I don’t know why it worked but it always did.” Clint volunteered; after Tony had curled in on himself again, the glass discarded on the table, with most of the contents absorbing into the baggy t-shirt Tony always wore in the lab.

“How the hell is Tony, of all people, going to do a handstand? I mean, just look at him.” Natasha gestured to where he lay exhausted, still whimpering and convulsing. “I doubt he could do it even before this.”

“I don’t think it is the actual handstand that has the desired effect, merely being upside down.” Clint chipped in, trying to help. He opened his mouth to elaborate but Thor interrupted loudly.

“I can help with this: anything for the Man of Iron.”

Before anyone could do anything to stop him, Thor had lifted Tony into the air by his ankles where he was now flailing wildly. This action didn’t help, as Thor only lifted him higher, to keep him from hitting the floor, only succeeding in making Tony's efforts more desperate. The rest of the group started shouting at Tony’s frightened yells as he swung about in the air, held by Thor’s firm hands. 

The whole room was in uproar, with Clint laughing and filming the event on his phone as the others panicked in their own ways. Thor seemed to get the message at that point, lowering Tony to the floor where he lay panting, fingers curling into the floor, as if that would help him stay there. He lay shaking slightly before sitting up, leaning his back against the side of the chair with an expression of reluctant hope plastered across his features. The hiccups had stopped.

~~~~~

“I am really happy that that worked, but not half as much as you should be," Tony said weakly, looking at Thor. "You ever do that to me again, I'll hang you from the top of this building by your golden tresses, Rapunzel." He was in a different set of clothes and wrapped in a blanket, this being the only sign of weakness that he had shown in all the time any of the Avengers had ever known him. Having been given the all clear by Bruce a few minutes ago with only slight internal bruising, he had been given orders to take it easy for a few days, a command unlikely to last beyond twenty-four hours.

“It could have been that you were upside down, but it was more likely the shock of being lifted into the air by the big man here that caused an end to the hiccups. You should be grateful.” Bruce grinned. “I think we have a meeting soon, so we better get moving. It'll put your mind off of what's happened. Get some fresh air, a nice ride in one of your cars.”

“We'll go, as long as I can drive,” Tony bargained, a hopeful look on his face. Bruce pulled an exasperated expression before conceding to the request.

When they arrived at headquarters it was clear that news – most likely in the form of Clint Barton and his smart phone – travelled very fast. Fortunately, Nick Fury travelled fast too. 

Everywhere they looked there were the tell-tale letters on desks that had obviously been given to every member of staff. Worst of all, however were the new recruits that had obviously been spoken to by the aforementioned Agent Barton, and who all went ‘Hic’ as soon as they saw Tony.

Bruce watched as Tony’s face became more and more guarded and sullen as each thing was noticed. It was painful to see him trying to hide again for something that was never his fault. It wasn’t until later in the day that Bruce managed to see one of the letters from Director Fury.

~~~~~

To whom it may concern,

Agents should be reminded that saying ‘Hic’ upon seeing Mr Stark is not acceptable behaviour for any agent and that it is, in no way, a sign of respect, despite what Agent Barton may have said. Mr Stark is much easier to handle when believing himself invincible.

On that note, Agent Barton is not to be listened to unless it is a direct and relevant order.

NICK FURY  
Director (S.H.I.E.L.D)


End file.
